Post Marbella

It's 2 weeks tomorrow that we returned from Marbella/Malaga. We managed to empty our fridge before leaving and, as we were leaving at silly-o'clock to catch our Ryanair flight on Saturday morning, we decided to have a mid-afternoon late lunch/early dinner on Friday at the on-site restaurant El Med, washed down by a nice white wine:

We'll be back there - probably next year. The resort is immaculate and mature. We were reminiscing about our first holiday there after we bought our time share. It was 1999 and Ross and Jo's Mum were with us:

At that time, only one "leg" - on the west of the resort - was complete:

From this October, 1998 archive photo I found on the web, you can see that construction had started on the next leg in the middle of the resort but I don't recall us being much troubled by any building work when we were there in 1999. This year, we tried to identify the unit we stayed in 25 years ago but were unable to agree which one it was. I guess some changes have been made over the years.

It has obviously been a wet winter in the UK (and it hasn't been much better since we've been back). The roof linings on our shed had started to break up and the shed roof was damp in places when we returned from Australia - it was definitely time for some remedial work. I started to remove the tacks holding the roof felt in place and we then lost one of the 3 strips of felt (on the apex) in the wind, so I had to borrow a temporary plastic cover for the time we were in Spain:

I've since returned this cover and have replaced it for the time being with our car cover until we can get a run of dry, warmer days to allow me to re-felt the roof:

I've got all the materials now so I'm hoping I can maybe start on it later next week. As you can see from the first of the 2 photos above, the issue with the fence has still not been resolved with our neighbour, so it will be tricky trying to work on that side of the roof. Incidentally, we think she may now be planning to do something independently. We await developments.

Next week our new Air Source Heat Pump arrives and the following week is when the installation takes place - we're replacing the existing narrow bore pipes and virtually all the radiators. It's going to be a week of chaos.

We've had our annual blood/cardio checks and, by and large, we're OK. Jo's doing some more blood pressure checks at home and the results seem reasonably good so far.

I've played 2 games of golf since we got back - I had to come off after 16 holes the first time and was in agony when I got home again, but I managed 18 holes this week - painful but manageable - just. In between those 2 rounds, I walked up Scolty last Friday. Going up was OK but coming down I was in terrible pain and only just made it back home. My left knee is beginning to feel increasinly like my right knee did before I got it replaced.

I'm now officially on the NHS waiting list for a (partial) knee replacement. It could be a long haul but I've indicated I would accept a cancellation and also that I'm willing to travel to get it done. Clydebank is one option, the other is Inverness. If it gets done in Aberdeen or Clydebank, the operation is done robotically, but Inverness is still old school. It's affecting my lifestyle and limiting the amount of activity I would like to take but I'm not ready yet to go private - that would cost £14K. I just hope I get the call from the NHS before the pain gets too much.

Keep the Family WhatsApp group going - stories, photos and videos.